KGS Go Server

The KGS Go Server, or simply KGS, is a popular Go server that can be accessed at http://www.gokgs.com/. It is common to have more than 1000 people logged in at any time. High profile tournament games from Europe and North America are sometimes relayed on KGS. KGS is generally deemed to be user friendly.

The KGS Go Server first opened under the name Igoweb in April 2000. The original rec.games.go announcement can be found here. Just a month later, the author made an agreement with Kiseido and it was renamed to the Kiseido Go Server. It was renamed to KGS Go Server in 2006. In 2017 it was sold to the American Go Foundation. William M. Shubert was the original developer of KGS.

Besides its obvious use as online Go-playing software, it facilitates escapers and it also has special features for teaching purposes. It is very easy to go through the game once it is finished to add variations and comments. You can ask an observer to add their own variations and you can save everything in SGF files. You can also upload games from your hard disk and review them on the server with your friends.

The client (known as CGoban3) has been written in English, and has been translated to Japanese, French, Italian, German, Chinese and other languages. More translations are welcome! The main "room" is called the English Game Room, but it is really an international room. There are also rooms where speakers of Chinese, Dutch, Esperanto, Finnish, French, German, Hebrew, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Russian, Spanish, Swedish, and Turkish are encouraged to meet. In addition, there are many, many other rooms from which you can choose, and you can also create new rooms if you so desire.

An example of getting KGS working on Windows 10 64bit

From the Oracle java page
choose the JRE link and then use the 'Windows x64' link, to download and install the 'jre-8u66-windows-x64.exe', which is the latest Java Runtime Environment. ( This slightly unusual choice is attempting to avoid Oracle's advertising supported version that tries to install toolbars or other trial software. )

At the bottom left of the Windows 10 desktop screen, use the main start button to get the 'All apps' menu.

Scroll down to 'Java', and use 'Configure Java'.

In the 'Java Control Panel' choose the 'Security' tab and 'Edit Site List' button.